Monthly Archives: October 2017

Raiden V: Director’s Cut Review

by Jason Parker (Ragachak)

Raiden V - Guns for Situations

Bring the right bullet for the job.

I have a love-hate relationship with Bullet Hells. I really love to hate them. They make me cross in a way I don’t feel comfortable writing down, for fear I scare children, and sensitive readers flail their arms and run in a blend of horror/disgust. But Raiden as a franchise always caught my eye. It combined the bullet hell style of dodging lasers and bullets with a jet that can dump just as many bullets onto the screen. This is terrific, but somehow makes the games even harder! Now you have to wonder to yourself, “Is that my bullet or theirs?” but fortunately yours almost always look different. But the last Raiden title I played was Raiden Trad/Raiden Densetsu in the Arcade/SNES. I spent so many damn quarters on it down by the beach with several of my friends each and every summer. So when I saw a newer one was lurking and I had somehow missed it, I jumped on the chance!

Raiden V - PEW PEW

PEW PEW TIME TO DIE!

Raiden V: Director’s Cut is a port from console and has the benefit of added stages that were not on the regular Raiden V. There are branching paths, and it has a health bar.  Well, a “shield system”, but instead of “one hit and you die”, you have a shield system before you crash and burn. When you do continue, you keep your powerups, which is another fantastic, wonderful idea that some people might think makes the game too easy. There’s a traditional mode and a boss run and it has two players … offline. Come on, this is a vertical shooter! Two players would be incredibly easy! That aside, it’s a blast to play, and though it seems to lack some of the difficulty of its predecessors for a few reasons, it’s incredibly fun and addictive.

Raiden V - Bullet Choice

You have choices. Don’t squander them.

You have three ships, the Azuma from Japan, the Moulin Rouge from France, and the Spirit of Dragon from America. Each ship has its own stats, in the Attack/Armor/Speed categories. Pick whichever suits you! From there you pick your weapon for the ship. There are gems that drop in stages, that change from Red/Blue/Purple. They correspond to the colors of the weapons you selected in the start. The Red/Orange selections are bullets (Wide Vulcan, Swing Vulcan, Moving Vulcan), the Blue are lasers (Lightning Laser, Charge Laser, Reflect Laser) and the Purple are Plasma (Bend Plasma, Catch Plasma, and Homing Plasma). If you keep collecting the same color, it levels up and does more fancy things, and it tracks the level (so if you swap to a different gun for some reason or another, you can go back to your level 8 Plasma, unless you want level 4 Vulcan). Personally, my favorite is the Homing Plasma, and my least favorite is the Reflect Laser. It puts out a gem that you shoot at that reflects the beam in a series of shots. It’s frustrating to use, but it has its uses, as does all of them. Though my favorite is Homing Plasma, it’s also dangerous in that it can only hit so many things at once and will no doubt put you in danger.

Raiden V -Blue Laser

Everything has a use!

But you also have a “Cheer Meter” that fills from killing enemies/collecting items on the map, and when its full you can hit Square to summon an ally that helps you fight! It also cancels all the enemy bulelts on the screen and boosts your sub-weapon. They appear to be other people who play the game because on the Game Over screen, you can see who cheered you on. There are also Bombs that obliterate everything on the screen (except Bosses, but still hurts them) and you start with three but can collect more. The missions are pretty straight-forward, but depending on how you perform (enemies left alive, damage taken I presume) you can lock other stages, side missions and such. Though speaking of difficulty, you have the following: Practice, Very Easy, Easy, Normal, Hard, Very Hard. In “Practice”, the enemies don’t fire, so you can learn patterns of ships, how the game works and get a feel for the controls. Personally, I only play on Very Hard, after trying Normal. Normal was no fun at all. I blazed through stages without taking a hit. But Very Hard? That’s exciting. The bullets shoot faster, so decision-making and precision dodging matter so much more. Not to mention there are 30 stages total to unlock and conquer, and that’s without Boss Rush! There’s plenty of replayability and challenge for even the most hardened bullet hell fan.

Spirit of BULLET HELL: 4/5

Raiden V - Stages

Plenty of stage options to unlock!

Honestly, the only thing holding this back is being able to change the color of your ship and to feature online co-op. The dialogue between the characters is great (it’s also the first Raiden game to feature a voice cast), it stays true to the vertical-scrolling bullet hell that the franchise is famous for, it’s fast, frenetic and you appear to have unlimited continues. The stages are gorgeous, and the constant glow of various lasers, bombs and explosions keeps you locked on the screen at all times. You definitely should keep an eye on the dialogue on the right side of the screen too, when you have downtime; it tells you how you’re doing, and I think it has something to do with unlocking stages. The alternate stages also appear to have different bullet patterns, making it one more thing to keep track of. There are tiny things I don’t get, like why the little gold items don’t always come to me when a group of them are together. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don’t. Having unlimited continues almost seems to make the game too easy, but the challenge of the fights makes up for that. If there’s a limit, I haven’t found it. I play a few stages, then put it down and come back. But it’s got difficulty settings for everyone, to get used to how the game plays and then gradually go up, or if you’re like me, and want to truly experience the horrors of war, you jump right into Very Hard and do your best! I don’t like that you can only have one save slot, but you do have a stage select, so that’s a positive. And this would be fantastic for couch co-op. As a long-time fan of this series, I’m very happy with the results. It feels like R-Type and Raiden in one lovely, convenient place.

Indie Pogo

Indie Pogo is a local or online multiplayer pixel-art brawler featuring a diverse roster of characters from indie games across the industry. Whether it’s the gallant Shovel Knight, or one of the rootin’ tootin’ Awesomenauts, you can be sure to have a hell of a time fighting your friends across each of the beautifully hand-crafted maps paying homage to their inspirations, available for Windows.

Features:

Everyone! Get in Here!: Other titles with featured playable characters: Teslagrad, VVVVVV, Bit Trip Runner, Freedom Planet, The Blocks Cometh, Rivals of Aether, Jack the Reaper, Stardop Blaster, Velocispider, Downwell, Peaelope, Octodad, Dust: An Elysian Tale, Gunvolt, Enter the Gungeon, and Divekick.

All-Age Entertainment: Easy to pick up and play but difficult to master, Indie Pogo was designed in such a way that allows everyone to have fun regardless of your previous fighting game experiences.

Indie-Cyclopedia: Collect trophies detailing indie games from all genres no matter how big or small they are.

Miner Meltdown Review

by Charles Perez (Kingsdecree)

Featuring hectic multiplayer action and some elements of economic management, Miner Meltdown is a refreshingly unique mashup of several different genres and visual styles. However, while built upon a cool eye-catching concept, there’s a lot left to be desired considering the lack of content and gatekeeping seven dollar price tag.

Spelunkaria
Looking somewhat like Terraria, the pixel-art graphics are pleasant without being overly simple or distracting. I would’ve liked more variety in what the actual environment looks like, but it’s not a big deal since you won’t be seeming much of it anyway with the limited lighting and over-the-top effects from all the weapons, which are powerful and aplenty. From a cheap reliable pistol to a devastatingly powerful rocket launcher, when you need something dead, you’ve got options.

In addition to the guns, you’ve also got some helpful auxiliary items like mines, glow sticks, and your choice of either a rope or jetpack to navigate around the map with. The rope in particular, which seems to be borrowed and improved upon from Spelunky, can be fired off infinitely and allows back-and-forth swinging to build up momentum for long distance gap closing. It’s certainly a blast to use and even more fun practicing to get better at it. Although, there are often times when you’re pretty much forced to use the boring jetpack instead due to the layout of the map.

 

Cabin Fever
In fact, the whole map design is infuriating. Usually these make-your-own-way multiplayer games (such as Ace of Spades/Block N’ Load) will have a default open path for a player to take if they just want to get right into the action and save the tedious underground-path creation for the infiltrators. Here however, you’re forced to start digging from the very beginning.

This is especially frustrating in game modes other than Crazy King (King of the Hill variant) because without an actual objective to seek out, you’re just milling about hoping to run into someone to fight amidst all the destructible terrain. It can be difficult to find people even with an objective because of the ever-dim lighting showing only a small area around you and your teammates. It’s neat to have some additional sight through glowsticks and the flare from jet packs, but otherwise it’s fairly rare to engage in combat without shoving your barrel down someone’s throat in close quarters – which, in turn, makes the expensive longer-range weapons much less impactful than they should be.

Show Me the Money
Even with the previously mentioned issues, you still have a relatively fun visually appealing multiplayer game with a unique twist, so why isn’t this game more popular? Well for starters, there’s no one actually playing it, and that’s not an exaggeration. Over the several days I was playing, and at various hours, there wasn’t even a single lobby hosting a match nor did anyone join the one I started. A low player count seems petty to complain about but it makes all the difference in a multiplayer title. It might be fine to start with, but playing against bots in the long run is not fun, exciting, or engaging.

And the reason why there’s no players? Because this is a free-to-play game that costs 7$. I totally get that making games costs money and the developers need to be able recoup their costs, but when the market is already so incredibly saturated with F2P battle arenas how can you possibly expect someone to pay for one? And just to be clear, Miner Meltdown is a multiplayer-only game. There’s no solo adventure or co-op content to speak of.

I seriously don’t get it; there are even cosmetics in the game, why not sell those instead? Or take this cool gameplay concept and make some non-PVP content for it. The tutorial already established it was possible, why not take it one step further? At least then when someone buys this game they would get something other than dull matches filled with dumb bots. And you know, there’s even healing gun available to unlock. It’s completely useless in the multiplayer, but I could see it being very helpful for co-op shenanigans like in a wave-based survival game mode. 


I encountered this bug in particular quite a few times.

They Dug too Deep (2/5)
Miner Meltdown at its core is a damn cool mix of so many different kinds of games, but was mercilessly kneecapped by a myriad of questionable choices and a non-existent playerbase. Even though I did enjoy some of my time with it (against bots), it isn’t worth your time and definitely not your money.

Note: A game key was provided for review purposes.

Star Trek Online (PC) Tzenkethi Shuk-din Escort Raffle

To celebrate the PC launch of Season 14 – Emergence, we’re teaming up with Perfect World Entertainment and Cryptic Studios to give away Tzenkethi Shuk-din Escorts [T6] for Star Trek Online.

Star Trek Online (PC) Tzenkethi Shuk-din Escort Raffle

Star Trek Online is a free-to-play massively multiplayer online game where players can pioneer their own destiny as Captain of a Federation starship, become a Klingon Warrior and champion the Empire through the far reaches of the galaxy, or rebuild the Romulan legacy as the commander of a Romulan Republic Warbird. In Star Trek Online, players have the opportunity to visit iconic locations from the popular Star Trek universe, reach out to unexplored star systems and make contact with new alien species. Star Trek Online is currently available on PC, PlayStation®4 and Xbox One.

To download and play Star Trek Online today for free, visit http://www.startrekonline.com


Tzenkethi Shuk-din Escorts

As expected with Tzenkethi design, the Shuk-din Escort [T6] is highly maneuverable with immense shielding capabilities for its size. It comes equipped with the latest in Tzenkethi shield technology, which allows the starship to massively increase defensive capabilities along all non-Forward shield facings. The forward array is tuned to offense, increasing the damage dealt by the ships’ weaponry against any foe within their forward-facing 90-degree arc.


To Enter The Raffle:

  • Visit the official entry thread. If you don’t have one, you will need to sign up for a forum account to post.
  • Post a reply to the thread telling us what your favorite part of the Season 14 update is!
  • Winners will be announced on Monday, October 16 and awarded their code via PM on our forums.

Imperial Hero II

Imperial Hero II is a F2P medieval-themed MMORPG where you get dictate every choice along your hero’s journey in becoming a living legend. Sculpt your personalized adventure amidst the expansive empire of Ayarr and seize your destiny, available via browser and Android.

Features:

Slayer: Travel deep into dangerous dungeons and defeat mighty enemies.

Artisan Merchant: Use the deep and rewarding crafting system to create and sell equipment to others.

Expansionist: Seek out and conquer another player’s assets in the guild-based PVP.